We’re going to start things out with the first Classic 2×20 of the season, and here’s the description of the workout, lazily cribbed from a post last year:

The 2×20 is one of the primary building blocks of your fitness, and is a great default workout. Short on time? Not sure what to do? Do one of these.

So, what the heck is it?

Pretty simply, the 2×20 looks like this:

– Warm up.

– Go as hard as you can for 20 minutes.

– Recover for 2 minutes.

– Go again for another 20 minutes.

That’s the basic version. Success on this is, however, all in the details.

The idea here is to go as hard as you can for the duration of both intervals without being forced to go easier at the end of the second interval. If you run out of gas before you finish the second interval, you went to hard. If your vision isn’t blurry at the end of the second interval, you went too easy.

If you’re doing this with a powermeter, you want your wattage output to be as close to constant as possible. We’re talking 10 watt variance at the most. Keep it steady.

These take practice to do well, and the better you get, the harder they get. This is another workout that works great on the trainer, and that’s how I do ‘em, which is a good thing… because I always wind up flat on my back on the floor trying not to puke after the 2nd interval.

I’m really not kidding about the seeing spots thing. If you can learn to push through your limits when you do these, you will get better and you will get better fast.

(…but, yeah, it will hurt.)

(…a lot.)

(…but, you know, the good kind of hurt…)

That’s the workout, and I’m sure you can’t wait to run right out and get going on it, but here are some thoughts before you leave…

– In the Seattle area, where I live, Tuesday nights are a local weekday circuit race, and that’s what I’m doing tonight. Take advantage of local racing when you have it, while you have it, there probably aren’t all that many road racing opportunities available as the season winds down.

– The 2×20 isn’t just a staple workout, it also doubles as a test session, a regular, oft-repeated metric of your fitness. Keep track of your performance in this, and all of the 2×20′s you do!

It doesn’t matter how you do it – wattage, heart rate, what gear you’re pushing on the trainer – just figure out some way of measuring your performance during the workout, and write it down.

Every time.

We will be referring to these metrics throughout the season, and your level of output in the 2×20 will form the basis for measuring your output in most of the workouts we do this season.

Stuff...

Personal Coaching?

You betcha. I do the personal coaching/trainer thing. Clients have included multiple National and even World Champions, and 2/3 of My Cyclocross athletes made the podium at Nationals in 2009, with one taking home the Stars and Stripes. Interested? Drop me a line at: crosssports@gmail.com

RSS me, ya’all…

Holy Crap! CrossSports schwag!

Yeah, that's right... if you have completely lost control of all sense of fiscal responsibility, you can now purchase silly articles of clothing with my blog address on them.
How cool is that?
Just go to - http://crosssports.spreadshirt.com/
and think "conspicuous consumption... mmm... feels so good..."